With the increased popularity of smart telephones, tablets, and other mobile devices, there has been a similar increase in the amount of data handled by the networks of mobile operators. To reduce the strain on network infrastructure and to reduce network transfer costs, mobile operators are shifting from offering simple unlimited mobile data plans to offering capped and metered plans. Some of these capped and metered plans are complex, with allotted data caps varying based on network type, time of day, etc. Further, the fees for exceeding the allotted data caps may be significant and may also vary based on network type, time of day, etc. The existing systems generally lack mechanisms to help the user understand and manage network data consumption and transfer costs in view of the data usage plans.
As a result, with the existing systems, users can unknowingly exceed the allotted data caps and experience bandwidth throttling (e.g., a reduction or limit placed upon the rate of consumption) and/or be presented with a much larger than normal monthly bill, resulting in “bill shock.” Throttling and bill shock can impact the user experience, leading to dissatisfied customers, increased customer service calls, and negative impressions of the mobile operators.
Some of the existing systems are focused on measuring network data consumption at content providers. However, server-based tracking such as by web site address in some of the existing systems fails to identify which particular application originated the request, at least because multiple applications on a device can access the same web site address. For example, some of the existing systems are not suitable for environments in which applications on a device queue data traffic with a centralized service executing on the device. In such environments, the identity of the originating application is not maintained and hence the network data usage is mis-attributed to the centralized service (rather than being attributed to the originating application). Such attribution is meaningless to the user trying to evaluate the amount of network data consumed by each application.